Google CEO Eric Schmidt has reiterated that the company is currently in negotiations with the Chinese government over its future in the country - despite the Chinese government's claims to the contrary - and he expects some sort of development "soon".
Speaking at a conference in Abu Dhabi, the Associated Press reports, Schmidt …

New motto

How about

How about..

.. "we fired the idiot who came up with this "evil" crap because we keep getting this thrown at us every time we want to make more profit" ..

What in the world possesses everyone to take a marketing statement as somewhere even remotely near reality? Didn't you learn enough from Microsoft? Hello?

Duh..

PS: how much do you believe the "negotiations" statement? IMHO it'll go something like this:

Google: "We want to be free of censorship"

China: "No"

Google: "We're going to throw another tantrum"

China: "Go ahead, make our day. Got hacked lately?"

Google: "Oh, err. But we may leave"

China: "Cool. Let me hold open the door for you"

Google: "But, but .." (walking out, bumping into a Microsoft rep wearing a Bing T-shirt arm in arm with the Baidu CFO)

Door: "Click" - end scene.

From a publicity point of view these guys have dug themselves a pretty deep hole. Disappointingly stupid IMHO, hopefully they'll learn from it. Google has the capability to do much better, as long as they leave off the posturing.

You had a fun idea

my guess: If Google unilaterally stops censoring then the "Great Firewall" disables Google access in China, probably in one second. The Chinese government probably has at least one web page that exists solely to be censored by the government. Any system that allows access to that page is not playing the game. You know about the EICAR not-an-actual-virus? Like that.

And if the Chinese people did get uncensored Internet access for some days, what would they find out? That if you don't have socialism then you don't get health care?

Maximum Exposure maximum loss.

It no longer matters what we think. Google wants to stay and continue to maximize the exposure to getting their technologies stolen. This problem will take care of itself. China will get all the relevant tech they need from Google and then make being in China difficult for them. Google will then find themselves competing against China and their own technology.